A Girl Pulled a 1,500 Year Old Sword Out of a Lake

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“I felt like a warrior, but Daddy said I looked like Pippi Longstocking.”

Eight-year-old Saga Vanecek didn’t have your average summer vacation. While on holiday with her family by Sweden’s Vidöstern lake in July, she found an ancient sword on the bed of the lake. She reacted as any of us would upon discovering the weapon in the lake’s shallow waters. She related to The Guardianin a firsthand account, “I pointed it up to the sky, put my other hand on my hip and called out, ‘Daddy, I’ve found a sword!'”

She’s a modern Queen Arthur pulling Excalibur from the Lady in the Lake. Move over, leaders of Sweden. We give Saga extra credit because she had to keep her find a secret for a couple months until archaeologists could see if any other antiquities were buried in the lake’s floor (they found a brooch and a coin). The youth gave the sword to the local museum, Jönköping County Museum, so others can view it. She liked the sword so much that her father started a fundraiser for the creation of a replica sword.

The museum dated Saga’s sword (best name or BEST?) and estimate it’s 1,500 years old. They’ve shared a detailed report about the sword’s composition and possible history. It’s from the pre-Viking era, so it’s kind of remarkable that it’s so well preserved. We think the sword should be displayed with the similarly rusted weapon that Matilda Jones found in a Cornish lake in 2017.

What’s the coolest thing you’ve found in a lake? Tell us in the comments.

Images: TNT

Amy Ratcliffe is the Managing Editor for Nerdist and the author of Star Wars: Women of the Galaxy (pre-order it on Amazon). Follow her on Twitter.